


Priceless

by RescueWombat



Series: ZenoHika Week 2020 [2]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: F/M, Fluff, ZenoHika Week (Final Fantasy XIV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:27:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26083414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RescueWombat/pseuds/RescueWombat
Summary: Prompt for ZenoHika Week 2020, day 2: "Treasure"
Relationships: Zenos yae Galvus/Warrior of Light
Series: ZenoHika Week 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1893682
Kudos: 7





	Priceless

To many people, Jarla Jacklaw was the Warrior of Light. To them she was an unattainable warrior, peerless besides those chosen few who stood alongside her, but to others…

To others she was still the Berserker, the madwoman that had rampaged from Vylbrand to the Black Shroud at the forefront of a raucous horde that barely met the requirements of a Free Company before finally being humbled at Cartenau where it was thought all but she and her two most trusted companions had fallen.

Others, though, knew her true self. That beneath her veneer of brutishness and ruthless greed, there lay an uncompromising code of honor, a fondness for those unable to defend themselves and a love for the quiet moments at dawn and dusk when the sky is dyed in all manner of vivid shades.

But there was one other who knew what she was truly like behind closed doors, what she hid from all but him.

He knew the sound of her quiet snores in the middle of the night, the pattern of her barely visible freckles and the rough texture of every scar on her body, from the thin line that fell perfectly straight down her left eye where she lost it at Cartenau to the thick knot of shredded flesh on her shoulder where she had taken a devastating blow in her fatal duel with her master, to the one he had personally given her.

That thin, almost surgically precise, cut where he had nearly sliced her in twain, perfectly straight just above her navel.

It was nights like this that regret struck him, regret for what might have been had he not been so drawn to this woman.

As he traced his fingers feather-light across that thin mark on her stomach, Zenos felt a pang of emotion that he still could not name.

It was like a tightness, but he somehow felt lighter than air. Numb to everything but her, but feeling so much at the same time. His soul roiled with this unexplainable emotion, but at the same time he felt utterly at peace.

Was this love? Was this deep, primal, unexplainable emotion love?

As he lay there with his arms wrapped around her, the crickets chirping quietly in the cool night air, Zenos yae Galvus came to a conclusion.

This emotion he felt as he held his first friend, his first love, in his arms, was the greatest treasure of all. Worth more to him than any exotic blade, more exhilarating than the most uneven of battles, Jarla Jacklaw was more than the Warrior of Light to him.

She was his treasure. His most precious person.


End file.
